Hell has three gates
by KeyKnows
Summary: The warnings have been there all along, Master Xehanort's smile, the dark glint in his eyes...Braig never saw them and when he did, it wasn't truly he who saw them, not at all.


_Hell has three gates: lust, anger and greed, I thinks it's easy to tell which one this is story is about._

* * *

Hell has three gates

There was something perverse in the way Braig liked seeing Terra in the place of Xehanort. He knew it was pathetic but he couldn't help but gloat a little at the kid's misery, even if he wasn't the cause of it. Terra had ultimately succumbed to darkness, and matter not how powerful the kid had been, strong enough to make a scar in the face of a Royal Guard, at the end, when it mattered, he had been weak, and now in his body was walking an amnesic mastermind. Served him right.

Braig wasn't that sure about believing that Xehanort had lose his memories though, it was the kind of inconvenience that the old coot would've prevented, but still, the amnesic apprentice seemed to know more that he let on and Braig couldn't help but wonder if he was just playing them like a flute. Still he decided to roll with it, or rather, humor him in the case the amnesia was an act, because he _trusted_ him.

Xehanort, in his young, new body, was ready to trust him too. He had been wary the first moments after waking up, looking at everyone like they were out to get him, but the moment he laid eyes on Braig, there was an unmistakable connection. Braig felt it too, it was like recognition or familiarity. Xehanort had then put his trust in him, puzzling the rest of the appetencies. It wasn't that they believed Braig untrustworthy, but they knew he didn't look like he _was_ trustworthy.

The spark of familiarity hadn't faced Braig in that moment, because he knew who Xehanort really was and Xehanort had get to known parts of Braig that he usually kept well hidden.

As time passed he realized that there was more to it than that, but to this day he wasn't sure what he thought about it.

In a way, he couldn't tell anymore.

* * *

Xehanort, the old, tattered man that talk with a dry, tired but wise voice, found him in the waterway. Braig liked going there to be alone, to smoke without the reproving gaze of his master, and to ponder things he usually didn't allowed himself to ponder.

Radiant Garden was a magnificent world, fitting of its name. It was vibrant and full of life, it was ruled by a kind, wise man, and wherever one could look it seemed as if the soil itself was full of light. It was as if the trees, the sky, the water of its rising waterfalls, every inch of the world, was ready to protect its inhabitants with its intense but delicate warmth.

It was a good world to live in. For most of the people, at least.

Even in its radiant beauty, Radiant Garden was by no means perfect and it wasn't short on unfortunate people. Braig used to be one of them. His family lived in lower quarter of the city, a place casted in the shadows of the castle and far away from the eyes of the more upstanding citizens, who may had found the sight unpleasant and unfitting of their wholesome kingdom.

His family didn't have much money and from a very young age he had to work to have right to the scarce food on his table and the flimsy ceiling over his head. From birth he had been destined to the unfulfilling, day to day life of a peasant, there was nothing more to those like him.

But even then Braig had wished for more. No more money, or a better house, or better parents, or a better life, but simply something more than _this_. More than these dirty streets and its dirty people, more than the hunger scratching at his stomach and the coldness nibbling at his bones, more than waking everyday wondering if he was going to make it to the night.

There had to be more, life couldn't just be this conglomerate of empty tasks that didn't do much but to keep him alive. There had to be something to be alive for, something that made worth the effort he put on not dying every day.

Those were ideas no one else in his environment shared, but this was not much surprise for him. He knew he was quite brilliant and quick witted, qualities that won him enemies in the streets and the resentment of most of his people. He got on his way to acquire books of any kind and he was always asking questions, always looking for whatever may had been out there that made of all this worthy. The others his age didn't understand, thought he was a show off, and most of the adults were bitter at his belief that there could be more for him, thought he didn't know his place.

As he grew older his hunger for something more grew larger too, but he had yet to found anything that could satiate him.

It was serendipity what guided him to Ansem the Wise. The man saw something in him that set him apart from the rest and he invited Braig to study at the castle. Only the more brilliant, or the more wealthy, were allowed to study there, so Braig took the opportunity the moment it was offered and he leave his family and his mediocre life behind without a second thought, thinking that in the castle he was going to find whatever he was yearning for.

He had always knew that his life at the lower quarter couldn't compare to how the wealthy lived, he always knew he was missing out in life, but it wasn't until he came to live at the castle that he realized how unfair all of it really was. Most of his classmates and roommates weren't half as intelligent as him, nor were they particularly good at anything else besides bragging about their parent's money. It made him realized how lucky he had been at sparking Ansem's interest.

But the handed out luck that fate gave him didn't make him feel grateful, rather he felt cheated, laughed out, humiliated even, because if it wasn't for Ansem and his good heart, if the ruler had happened to be a less kind man, he would still be trapped in the lower quarter, without real chance of ever getting more.

It infuriated him, the unfairness of it all. It was out of luck too, that he ended up in the Royal Guard. He got into a fight with some trainee and he won, not because he was stronger but because he played his cards better. That night, when someone came knocking at his door, he was expecting to get thrown out of the castle, instead, the captain of the guard came to ask him to join. He did, if only to spite on the trainee even more.

(He had laughed at his peasant upbringing and he had called him a charity case, and now the charity case was going to be his comrade. Take that motherfucker.)

His luck kept taking him places, getting him benefits and the knowledge he had ever longed for but even if he was living a better life, it was still sour in his mouth. It was maddening that things like that got decided by luck, that there were some who got handed things out and those who were stuck with nothing. Granted luck had gave him much, but he didn't _like_ it.

Still he was happy, more of less, studying at the castle, learning all he could about the world and for a while it seemed to him that he may had found some of what he was looking for.

When he became an official Royal Guard and Ansem took him under his private tutelage alongside Even, Dilan and Aeleus (Ienzo would come later) it became apparent that there was even more to know, but such knowledge was forbidden to him and the others and he couldn't see why. Why Ansem received strange visitors from time to time, and why there were books that even they weren't allowed to read, questions they weren't allowed to ask. Why was Ansem the only one with the _privilege_ of knowing all of that, with the freedom to research whatever he pleased?

Their master would gaze longingly at the stars and Braig started to question too, whether the stars were what they had been told they were.

He brought it on to his friends once. Even had laughed and Dilan asked him if he was drunk and Aeleus gave him an unamused stare. But Braig had argued, what about the old stories that talked about the light in the hearts of children, of stars blinking out of existence in times of war, of places that couldn't exist, what about Master Ansem's weird visitors, and what could be out there that they weren't allowed to question. Weren't they men of science, weren't they supposed to always think beyond, why wasn't Ansem, their teacher, allowing them to do so.

Even had been silent in contemplation, Dilan didn't seem to know what to say and Aeleus hummed with curiosity.

Despite all he had Braig still wanted more and he was so tired of depending on luck to get it.

Xehanort found him in the waterway, smoking and pondering all that had no explanation and all that he wasn't allowed to ponder on.

Braig had been quick to dismiss the old man, he looked like a nut case, but then the man had talked about how not even the blinding light of the Garden could cast away the shadows that lingered in men's heart.

"You're much like I was, young man," Xehanort had said, looking at Braig as if he was measuring some intangible quality in him.

"What do you want, old coot?" has been Braig's eloquent answer.

Xehanort had explain he needed help in some unclear task and when Braig told him to piss off, Xehanort summoned a sword like no other Braig had seen and said that if he wasn't willing to help him, there was surely someone in other world who would be.

Those words fed the animal hunger inside of him but did nothing to really satiate him. The way Xehanort smiled should've been a warning, but Braig couldn't heed it, because there was more out there and when he questioned the old man on how he knew that, how he could travel to another world, Xehanort said:

"Answers come to those who seek them, young man. Such matters cannot be let to luck."

It was, he would think later, like he could read him, like he knew exactly what to say. That should've been a warning too.

"All right," Braig had said, throwing the rest of his cigarette at his feet "I'm listening."

Terra bested him, of course, Xehanort told him he was going to lose, he just never told him to what extent. He had been furious, but he knew his place so he couldn't really reclaim anything to Xehanort. He didn't have the strength, the power or the knowledge to face him, the only thing he had was the role Xehanort had given him in a conflict he didn't understand at all.

Dilan asked him, the day he fought Terra and came back to the castle with his face covered in blood, what had happened.

"An unfortunate accident," had been Braig's answer as he poured a potion on his face quite recklessly.

Dilan had pressured for a more a consistent answer, but Braig denied him one.

Later that night Ansem came to his quarters, worried, and asked him as well about what had happened. By then Braig had an elaborated but believable lie about an accident practicing a new move and Ansem had believed his every word because he _trusted_ him. Still Ansem saw the need to talk to him about the dangers of biting more than one could chew, about recklessness, about how there was no need to push himself so hard and test his luck. Braig hated every second of the talk because he wasn't tempting luck, but rather forging his own path.

The moment Xehanort shared his plans with him and told him he would share a part of him with Braig, so he could do as necessary while Xehanort took Terra's body, Braig accepted because he needed the power, if he wanted to ever gaze over other worlds, if he wanted more than this he had to some sacrifices, he couldn't just sit and wait for his luck to do everything yet again.

"Will I have a Keyblade then?" he had asked Xehanort.

The old man had smiled.

"Not immediately, but in time, you will wield one."

The Keyblade would allowed him the freedom and the power he so much longed for, that he needed if he ever wanted more.

So he accepted. The way Xehanort's eye shined when he did, should've been a warning too.

* * *

Xehanort's lost memory was a problem since it made it impossible for him to keep his end of the bargain. Braig didn't know how he was supposed to get a Keyblade, even with a part of Master Xehanort inside him, and the young amnesic man didn't seem to be able to summon his own Keyblade at all. When Braig confronted him about it he seemed utterly lost and looked at him with the eyes of a child that didn't understand what was happening.

It was a problem too, because whatever plan Master Xehanort had intended to put in action once he had Terra's body, didn't have place in the mind of Xehanort, apprentice of Ansem the Wise.

It infuriated him, because Xehanort seemed to be content enough living in Radiant Garden, studying at the castle and readily taking the brotherhood that was offered to him. Braig knew it wasn't supposed to be like that and he hated that Xehanort could just _forget_ and take this simply, mundane happiness and be okay with it when he himself couldn't.

[He would be too engrossed with this train of thought that he wouldn't consider how, even if he had always been disappointed in life, it wasn't until now that the idea of having nothing more than what he had in Radiant Garden really revolted him. And if he did considered such thoughts, then he silenced them with the very logical explanation that it was such because now he knew there was indeed more out there.]

Braig didn't know what were the plans Master Xehanort had, didn't know what exactly was Kingdom Hearts, nor why the old man had wanted it so bad and he didn't understood at all what was needed it to achieve it, all he knew was that Master Xehanort had wanted his help with all of that and then he would get his own Keyblade, his own power and his own freedom.

So, if Braig wanted the old man to hold his end of the deal, then he needed to accomplish his.

When Master Ansem started to look into how to recover Xehanort's memories, messing with hearts and darkness and such, Braig saw his perfect opportunity. It wasn't hard to put Xehanort in the right path, he was a curious man of science himself, and sooner than later the young man was the one pushing the research to its last consequences.

The rest of the apprentices were quick to follow too, and at the end it was Xehanort the one to instigate them, the one to defy Master Ansem orders, the one that wanted to discover all there was to know about hearts.

Braig simply followed him too even if, for some reason, it was hard sometimes. He spent more time with Xehanort than he did the other apprentices and his friends, his brothers in arms, resented his absence. Even if Dilan followed them too, it was hard to miss how sometimes he would look at Braig in the eye and wonder; there were so many questions that he never voiced at all, and Braig thought he knew what those where: he got a similar feeling when he looked himself in the mirror and his eye shined in yellow and not brown.

Aside from Xehanort, Even was the most captivated by their research, he had always been the truth scientist among them, but even him got wary sometimes, especially when little Ienzo got such an active part on the experiments. He's just a child, he would say sometimes and if Aeleus was near he would agree, but still, that didn't stop any of them.

Braig was okay with that…wasn't he? That everyone would so readily support the experiments, that Xehanort got a glint in his eyes that was more the old man's and less the clueless kid's, because it meant he was doing his part so he would, eventually, get what he was owed.

With the passage of time the idea of questioning such logic didn't even cross his mind.

* * *

"…But you," Sora said, almost desperate "aren't you scared of just turning into someone else?!"

Yes. No. Perhaps he had been scared, before, when he and Xehanort dragged the rest of the apprentices into their unethical experiments, into the darkness, into the nothingness, after he betrayed the man that had gave him everything and the men that had become his family, perhaps he had been afraid...

"Me?" he said with a smile full of teeth, instead "I'm already half Xehanort."

The horror on Sora's face should have been a warning, a telltale sign that this was wrong, wrong, _wrong_ : who would give themselves willingly to the darkness, who would let themselves be obscured and consumed by other's conscious, by other's will, by other's heart.

But those ponderings were nothing but an echo rumbling in the deepest chambers of his heart, a heart that was and wasn't his, and instead of alarming him at all, the horror on Sora's face filled with some kind of perverse satisfaction.

But soon the horror gave place to determination and Sora showed him what real power looked like, all the hearts connected to him, his reason to fight and to don't lose. He was both repulsed and marveled at the sight, both afraid and hopeful.

 _Help me_ , the dying part of his heart called, but did he wanted the help at all? Would he had ever wanted the help at all?

Even if he wanted the help, even if some part of him was still able to feel any guilt over his acts, to yearn for his lost friends, for the good life he had so scorn at…he couldn't tell anymore.

And it was impossible to say too, if he couldn't because of the heart overlapping his own, or because he didn't really have a heart to call his own anymore.

* * *

 _I love Xigbar so much_

 _You have no idea, idek why I love him as much as I do, he's the worst and those fucking games haven't really tell us much about him? like why did he wanted a keyblade? what are his motivations? we just don't know so here, have this attempt to backstory that is more or less a canon complaint._

 _I find interesting how all the Xehanorts seem to be pretty much their own person, with different personalities and all, and how they don't seem to know everything about their plans, it implies a lot about those characters. I also find really interesting Xigbar's reaction to Sora's speech about his friends being his power, Xigbar was so unnerved by all of it, it beggets questions, so, here, have my two cents_

 _I really liked this idea, but the execution is kinda sloppy, at this point however i feel that i can't really do more for this story, so welp, hope you find it enjoyable in any case :3_

 _Thanks a lot for reading! Every comment will be appreciate! xoxo_

 _Pd. I love him so much is not funny TT_TT_


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